A Silver Band
by WoolyJoe
Summary: Despite the ongoing war with both the Reapers and Cerberus, Shepard somehow finds herself locked in an instance in which she can do nothing to aid the fight, unexpectedly caught in a space in which she has nothing but time to think and reflect on how she got there, and how it's taken its toll on herself and those around her.


___This is the beginning of a short story about Commander Shepard and Liara T'Soni, set during the events of _Mass Effect 3_ in which the pair find themselves, despite the odds, stranded on the Citadel with nothing to do but wait, bringing about an at once vivid yet surreal instance of both clarity and apprehension, with Shepard caught between what's been set in motion and what it is s____he believed she wanted._

_Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to anything, Mass Effect or otherwise._

___Written for_ Katie, in thanks for everything.

* * *

_**A Silver Band**_

**Pt. 1 – **_**Widow**_

"It's something, isn't it?"

Shepard squinted into the light and stretched out her arm, gazing between splayed fingers whilst the palm shielded her eyes.

Blinking she shifted her gaze and watched a cloud sail aimlessly across the taut blue sky, tracing its edge until lost amongst the sunshine. There was a shift of movement, a glimmer of tension in the air that altered the atmosphere, and as she turned to try and catch whatever was happening there was a rush of movement past her ear, an irritation gracing her hair, and she released an intake of breath as a pair of hands draped themselves gently over her eyes. Wrapping themselves cool across her forehead, stealing the view and lowering a brief, muted quiet.

Shepard felt the soft clatter of teeth on her ear, followed by the moist-heat of another's breath against her neck. "Isn't everything?"

"Yeah, but I don't think I've ever stopped and just looked up at the sun before."

"That's because you know better then to stare straight into a star."

With a grin Shepard's body became slack - her shoulders collapsed as though dragged down by the tension that fell from her muscles in reverie and her chin dropped, brought down by the smile that tugged at her lips.

"Maybe I do," she said, tilting her head back towards the sun, letting a warmth catch the contours of her face as rays of bright, sunburst light broke through the fingers that held her eyes, dancing and coiling in the darkness. "But maybe I've decided it's worth the risk."

The body behind her shifted itself closer; adjusting against Shepard's back its elbows pressed down against her arms as a voice closed in on her ear, anticipation brought with the soft tickle of warm breath. "Do you think a quick look is worth the risk?" it asked in a tone softer than before, as if promises were laden beneath the sultry air. "What if you went blind? You might miss out on so much more…"

Shepard pushed herself off the railing that separated the crowded public walkways from the empty municipal grounds, and she chuckled lightly in the only way expected of her.

"Well, you know me…" She reached up and took the hands from around her eyes and into her own, bringing them to her waist. Blinded for a moment by the bright skies reflected from the pristine walls and clear waters that coated the Presidium, she gazed down at their woven fingers, and she blinked.

"…I've never been much afraid of getting burned."

Shepard squeezed the fingers in her hands and smiled, her eyes adjusting to the light as she looked out across the Presidium at the milling crowds, glancing at the fountains that shot up from the lake and the skycars that passed overhead, looking to each as if they hadn't been at all present until this moment. She turned her face away from the shimmering water and looked at Liara as she nestled her cheek against Shepard's neck with a sigh.

"After everything's done…" Liara began, her words carried off by the _hum_ of a low-flying skycar, her voice trailing off, dimming until it was gradually lost to the Presidium's buzz of stilted-traffic.

"Yeah?" Shepard encouraged warmly, smiling to her side, pushing her fingers between Liara's to strengthen her grasp, allowing them to become intertwined.

"When this is all over, _truly_ over, and we finally have a moment to ourselves, with no need to worry about assassins behind us, or… devils in front, do you think you'll ever want to come back?"

"To the Presidium?" Liara didn't reply. And whilst watching a C-Sec Patrol car skim the lake's surface in a flurry of beauteous mirage, throwing up every faucet of spectral light, Shepard considered the question. "Don't you?"

"That's not what I asked" she replied, her voice clear even as she spoke with her face turned away.

Shepard looked over the green pastures and towards the crowds gathered across the waters and she asked, speaking to the air, addressing the station, "Do you think we'll come back to the Citadel?"

"No" Liara said after a beat, her tone as definitive and sure as it ever was. And unhooking her hands and wrapping them around Shepard's waist, she rested her chin on her shoulder and stared out into the lake. "We'll find our own corner of the galaxy, and once there we'll carve out a small place for ourselves. Somewhere without any maps or street signs."

"With no history to get in our way?" Shepard asked, again turning to try and smile reassuringly over her shoulder.

She felt Liara nod against her. "Somewhere we can just spend long, quiet days adrift. We won't want to come back. We'll be happy."

Removing a hand from the railing and placing it over those wrapped about her waist, Shepard glanced down and half-murmured, "Yeah…" and rubbing the pad of her thumb along a wrist she turned her head just slightly and muttered, "That sounds like a plan."

Liara hummed in content agreement and they both gazed absentmindedly over the lake. Their eyes became heavy and focused on nothing, regarding the vertical waters cast up by the fountains carelessly; the looming artificial sun blazed down across the white-steel, melting down as it hit the calm, crystalline waters of the Presidium ring, leaving nothing but this warm haze of golds and silvers. For an instant the sounds that surrounded the couple blended into the walls; metropolitan voices and clattering footfalls died away steadily as ceasefire, and all at once the station slowed to a lost crawl. Shepard felt a kiss against her collar; she felt Liara shut her eyes like she didn't want to share the moment, and for a second all the chaos and light of the universe were missing, blended together in a sharp haze of feeling and remoteness.

But there came a flash of insight; an instance of pure, cold wit in which the world had suddenly become overbearing and menacingly whole as the weight of it all began to shift around Shepard: Liara's body coiled itself over her back in a slither of warm memories; their hands, bound together around her waist, tightened up against her abdomen and pulled up underneath her ribs; she closed her eyes, shutting out the Citadel, and left just a soft tickle of breath that fell against her neck - but there was something else; intangible yet distinct as within a ripple amid the air, skirting across the waters, climbing through the floor; Shepard opened her eyes and looked out across the station and there's a scarce second flashing out of nowhere, fleeting like something caught in the reflection of a lover's eye; and the moment seems to drag itself out of the present to merge amongst atoms and she shifts her gaze to catch a stuttering movement behind her – behind them both; and so she moves, twisting her arm free and reaching back as if to throw Liara against the bar and take her place, but everything feels adrift; her fingers twitch into fists and her shoulder blades become lithe - there's nothing but the affection of Liara's breathing and a dull, throbbing sensation between every inch of sinew as if her mind were lagging full seconds behind each action, her movements barley ringing true with what she wants, what she's aiming for - instances of motion that travel further back than she can see, and for this instance of forced hesitation, this moment of unbridled uncertainty she's trapped, paralysed between chaste adrenaline and hard, frozen rain, and before she's even entered that blue place, Shepard sees it's all too late and everything built within their moment together – the soft rise-and-fall upon her back, the quickening of a pulse beneath her palms, the teeth placed at her neck – recedes back behind that damnable war and all its conflicts and fear, and then the blow connects.

With the weight of Liara pressing into her back Shepard, knocked forwards with her hands still holding onto those around her waist, lost her balance and fell heavily into the railing, her abdomen taking the full-force of the shove. The touch was light - a thing between strangers on a crowded ward that's barely worth note, a nudge you'd forget against conversation. But her unfocused gaze and dry throat only became apparent when Liara's hands unfurl from her waist, letting go the small bunches of fabric they'd gathered from the Alliance tunic. Bitter, angry, lost, and ashamed, Shepard turns to catch an apology and the side of a face as it turns away: a turian; a municipal worker with an ungainly stride created by the small pile of boxes filling his arms and upsetting his balance. His voice managed to filter through the whirr of the Citadel, making itself heard in a half-mumble and sounding more forced than it was perhaps intended.

"I suppose even the smallest apology should be more than enough in times like these" Liara said, wiping a gleam of sweat from her palm against her thigh. And Shepard realised she'd been holding her breath.

Again, it was Liara who grounded Shepard's thoughts. And after catching one another's eye she turned back to the crowd, staring after the turian. She felt no animosity for the contact, for the moment it spoiled – she felt that the clumsiness of it belonged here. Yet she's watching his back until he's lost, leaving just a dull throbbing sensation in her abdomen.

"No…" Shepard replied absently, crossing her arms. Liara accepted the answer, taking something from it as she turns back to look across to the other side of the Presidium, bending her legs and folding her arms as she leaned forward, balancing against the handrail, each staring behind the other.

Shepard continued watching the busy crowds and sighed into her chest. Taking a few steps forwards she stretched her arms high above her head, listening patiently until she caught the sound of a satisfactory _crack_, before lowering them and rolling her neck around in small circles, swinging her arms back and forth, clearly agitated in both body and spirit.

As if she were studying the situation absent-mindedly, Shepard moaned loudly, possibly more self-consciously then intended, into the throngs of people that barely came or went. And after breathing in deeply, her head tilted towards the Citadel's beauteous, ephemeral sky, Shepard quickly and vigorously rubbed her eyes with two fists and turned back to Liara and the clear shining lake behind her.

"You know, I don't think I've had to stand in line for anything this long since I finished basic" she griped, her tone caked in futility as she looked towards the distant transit terminal, with a hand placed straight against her forehead to shield her eyes from the light, the glimpse of a smile caught in her periphery.

"I'm sure Citadel Control are sorry for the inconvenience, Commander," Liara said in the neutral, bordering-on-condescending manner Shepard had since come to find so endearing, "and thanks you for all your patience."

Shepard crossed her arms and began looking over the heads of the crowd, watching for the skycars, an ounce of theatrics held confidently in her each and every motion.

"I'd hoped that being reinstated as a Spectre would actually count for something this time 'round, not just act as some… hollow boast," she said, bitterly – a mixed ire and resignation displacing any potential sincerity.

"It matters to those that matter, Shepard."

Shepard turned around and walked back to the railing, resting against an elbow as she leaned over to Liara, running a hand backwards through her hair. "Oh yeah?"

"Yes."

Shepard smiled coyly in that way expected of her: just a slight curl at the corner of her mouth, a glint of white teeth, and an unmistakable glimmer behind the eyes.

Leaning back she folded her arms and casually observed the surrounding area. "Well, it's widely acknowledged that women do love a Spectre."

Liara turned and looked up to Shepard. "Oh yeah?"

"Yeah," Shepard said, her voice jarred between both authority and frivolity. "Especially those with some scars to bring back. Why do you think I became a Spectre in the first place?"

Liara turned around and stared into the overflowing commons, folding her arms in kind.

She remained silent, considering the question carefully, and then she spoke out all at once, the slight and subconscious hand gestures of a professor bringing her words to life and spinning them about the air. "Because you wanted to get back at Saren for embarrassing you in front of the Council, the Spectres, and Captain Anderson back on Eden Prime."

Shepard shrugged. "Partly..." And as though she created the pause between them just to be broken, she continued just as Liara opened her mouth to reply. "But then that would only be half the story, wouldn't it? You shouldn't believe everything you hear reported on the news, T'Soni."

"And because the Alliance felt undervalued when they learnt that their star candidate - the brilliant sole-survivor of Akuze and vanguard of humanity, the daring and invulnerable Commander Shepard - had been passed over for recruitment into the Spectres in favour of a renowned elcor strategist."

Shepard remained quiet, and the pair stood and watched the hurrying crowds as they filed from their homes and businesses, their arms full and faces concerned.

"What was his name?"

"He preferred to remain anonymous. Except to the Council, of course." Shepard merely nodded, motioning a nonplussed understanding. Liara smirked and said, in the matter-of-fact tone of a true academic, "The Elcor are notoriously modest, Shepard. They consider renown or fame to be distracting, if not simply unappealing."

Shepard nodded again, her features remaining absolute.

"It's fascinating, really," she continued. "The closer you travel to Dekuuna, the more the elcor appear to find egotism - even basic self-assertion not only demeaning, but physically repugnant."

Another nod, her features remaining resolute.

Liara looked over and saw that Shepard's eyes were cast downward, her brow furrowed deep in thought. After stealing a glance and noticing that she was being watched Shepard looked over and they quietly gazed into one another's eyes for a beat, the crowds passing them by as a distant vibration that crawled about the arms and up the spine.

Breaking the silence with a relieved sigh, Shepard looked away and laughed quietly into the air, running a hand through her hair in an attempt to disarm any escaping discomfort.

"That's not funny, T'Soni," she said in relief, rubbing the back of her neck and glancing at the floor, resting a hand on her hip as she took a small step forward. "You can't use all your power and influence just to tease me – you know that as far as I'm concerned everything you say could easily be true."

Taking a few more steps forward, Shepard re-crossed her arms in a mock-pout the galaxy would think beneath a Spectre and muttered, "I should have you shipped off to Hackett..."

Liara repressed a grin and spoke glibly, as a parent might with children caught telling a lie. "You have no-one to blame but yourself, Shepard, so you can stop griping."

"Perhaps I like griping?" Shepard said, turning on the sport with a grin. "I've found that it's the best way to get your attention.

"Besides," Shepard began, again staring off to the transit station, her hands balanced on her hips and Liara held firmly in her periphery. "You're beautiful when you're irritated."

"Now you're simply trying to make me blush…"

"Well you do, T'Soni, whether you know it or not. Your cheeks go this beautiful, flushed-violet colour when you're agitated, and your voice takes on this… sultry, piercing quality when you're frustrated."

"Does it?"

"Yeah. Kinda like now, actually…"

"Okay, Shepard, then I apologize for misleading you. Your appointment into the Spectres was as a result of your fierce cunning and charm, and not merely in spite of the elcor."

Shepard hooked her hands behind her back and tilted her head in the small, modest bow of an Alliance officer. "Apology accepted, T'Soni," she said with the same tone of voice Liara had only heard used in conversation with admirals Hackett and Mikhailovich; a manner of speech Liara had just decided she disliked upon having it directed at herself. "But I have to ask," Shepard began; returning to the rail and her casual, limber self before Liara had time to think. "What did you mean when you said I had nobody to blame but myself?"

Liara offered a half-smile and gestured to Shepard to turn back with her to the lake. A series of patrol cars had aligned themselves aside the promenade directly opposite and their lights flickered against the lake's surface, casting delicate prisms of colour along the walls beneath the water. "I suppose you're not entirely to blame. I've been aboard the Normandy too long, now. The habits of you and your crew are staring to rub-off on me…"

Liara grinned nostalgically and addressed Shepard, although she continued to talk into the lake. "I used to spend hours trying to figure out whether Joker was joking with me or not. I still cannot entirely distinguish when he's poking fun at me or not… It has dragged on to the point now where I avoid his questions entirely."

"You've been ignoring Joker?" Shepard asked with too much surprise to portray as playful. "Really? I didn't think such a thing was possible...!"

"Not all the time" Liara grinned back. "At least not when the hull is on fire or you're attempting to climb atop a Reaper."

"So only when it's serious?"

Liara nodded slowly into a smile. "It's not as rewarding as you might think, though. His persistence is possibly worse than the inherent sarcasm in his voice."

Liara laughed into the air and folded her arms beneath her chest. "Can you believe that he once asked me whether or not the asari had gills?" She smiled to the floor and shook her head lightly. "You wouldn't believe that he is a commemorated star-ship pilot. An inquisitive child whom has seen one too many vids, perhaps, but not a trusted crewman."

"Huh, yeah…" Shepard was staring at the floor, her brow knitted in a moment of deep, troubled thought, and appearing to be only half-listening to Liara. Leaning over a little towards, she asked in a whispered, puzzled voice, "So… the asari don't have gills?"

Liara tilted her head slightly towards Shepard and then turned around to the crowds on their side of the lake, her eyes narrow and arms tight across her chest.

'That's not funny."

"Perhaps not," Shepard said with a small smile, turning with Liara. "But we are even."

Shepard glanced behind her again and fought the urge to grin. "You're lucky I need you and your smile like some sort of special drug, T'Soni, otherwise I don't think I'd put up with you."

"So if I stopped smiling around you, you would, how did you put it…? 'Ship me off to Hackett'?"

"Not straight away. First I'd find out who you were smiling at. And then I'd ship you both off to Hackett."

Liara giggled lightly and Shepard resisted looking across by brushing her hair back and smiling towards the floor.

"You'd both be assigned to different teams when you got there, of course."

"Forever the charmer, Shepard."

Shepard shrugged; "I try." Liara grinned, and raising a hand and flicking her fingers she invited Shepard move closer to her side, their backs again to the lake, shoulders pressed together.

Their laughter was quickly absorbed into the noises of the crowds, and they were both left standing in the hollow silence that can only be found whilst living in the city.

"It's a first, Shepard," Liara said, speaking into the busying mob. Her voice was becoming shallow, and Shepard watched her from the corner of her eye, her face oddly poised. "People want to feel safe here, but after Cerberus they don't know what to do. This is the Citadel. When a war stretches to the centre of the galaxy…" Her voice trailed off and she unfolded her arms, leaning back against them and looking up into the veiled sky that stretched out from behind the pale honeycomb of businesses and homes that lined the Presidium ring.

"At least we're given this moment to relax," she added, glancing back to the floor, her hand searching for Shepard's. "I doubt there are many people who could say the same."

Shepard wove her fingers between Liara's when she noticed a small child - no more than 9 she'd guess - rock on their heels as they asked Avina question after question after question. The hologram's arms stuttering from one sweeping gesture to the next as the demo tried to keep up with the queries.

A skycar landed on the floor above their own, hovering above a small crowd that had formed around a turian doomsayer, whose arms stretched to a rigid, hostile tremor that denoted nothing but his certainty and vulnerability.

"It's a strange pleasure, isn't it?" Liara began as a small contingent of C-Sec agents, their chests embezzled with the piercing blue that come from the certainty that keeps authority away from Marshal Law. Shepard felt one of her knees quiver and her chest contract viciously, but the only sign that something bothered her, no matter how briefly, was captured in her how her eyelids remained shut a fraction of a second longer than necessary. When she opened them she saw one of the agents leaving his vehicle and heading towards the doomsayer, an arm stoically close to his side. And Liara continued: "Not being able to do anything for the war. This might be one of the last moments of peace we have for a long time…"

Shepard watched as the C-Sec agent stopped a few feet from the flustered turian, and she found it difficult to focus her eyes on any individual thing: the doomsayer; the police officer; the child and Avina. She rubbed her eyes again with her free hand and smiled to Liara when she felt her fingers tighten.

"Whether we want it or not."

* * *

_This is a heavily edited version of the original upload - and I'd like it to be the final draft of the first part, although I think that's unlikely... I'm slightly nervous about is the part where Shepard tries to ignore the nagging apprehension that's bothering her and, for want of a better phrase, puts on a brave face. When I started writing this piece it was much, much shorter and a lot more 'dialogue-based', so I've tried to bring that back towards the end - and now that I think about it, I think the original end of Pt. 1 came at Shepard's _"No..."_, but I figured it was a tad too inconclusive, so I added on the exchange between the two where they've both got things on their minds, but because they're alone together, both Shepard and Liara just want to enjoy one another's company. Anyway, I'm rambling... I hope people (you) enjoy (enjoyed?) the first part of _A Silver Band._ The second part might be up quite soon - I think it's called _'Small Steps Against Inertia'_, but I also have a note that simply reads _'Warmer Climate'_, so I might've meant it to be that. Got a preference? Let me know. To be honest right now it's a stalemate (In that I forgot why I wanted either...)_

_If you'd like to help by leaving a review to let me know about any mistakes or simply what you like/dislike, it'd be greatly appreciated, as I've been trying to finish this for months but haven't had much time (NONE!) to really work on it. It'd also help remind me that it's been uploaded __so I don't forget to (hopefully) make the updates as they come. Thanks go to those that have already taken the time to read and/or review (You know who you are! ;)_

_Written and dedicated to ~celticknotgirl_


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